Green Schools Visits Truro Elementary

Truro Elementary has been very busy this year! Pam was invited for a visit to the school in May 2017 to talk to students at all levels about energy and energy efficiency. 

Pam was fortunate to visit Truro Elementary’s Green Team back in the fall, and they have had an incredibly busy and successful year. The school recently received a large grant from the Nutrients for Life Foundation to start a school garden. The Green Team and many other students are already so excited about this project! The school is in the process of creating this exciting new space. The Green Team also did a successful battery recycling promotion to ensure they will be recycled instead of leaching chemicals into the ground in landfills. This group helped recycle cell phones as part of the Recycle My Cell campaign, too!

Pam provided lots of learning opportunities about energy, including a foundational presentation about energy and the environment, games and songs to get students moving, and measuring energy used by appliances and LED lightbulbs. The activities helped the students learn about energy consumption, and to think about ways to reduce energy use. It’s not very often that we think about how our choices impact the world around us, and it’s helpful to have reminders like a visit from an enthusiastic Green Schools NS Engagement Officer. There are many positive effects that arise from energy efficiency, such as using less fossil fuel and slowing climate change!

Pam set aside time for students to ask questions, and in turn, asked them two special questions:

Do humans like us need the Earth to survive? Yes! We depend on Earth to host us and provide for our needs.

Does the Earth need humans to survive? No. The Earth was here billions of years before us, and can go on without humans. For more information, watch a video from Conservation International, Nature is Speaking.

During lunch hour on the day of Pam’s visit, the Green Team reused plastic food containers with clear domes to plant their own mini greenhouses at lunch time! These students prepared seeds to plant later at home. The Truro Elementary Green Team is doing so many green things to keep our planet safe and healthy.